What is the half-life of a baccalaureate degree? The concept of half-life understands the reality that many things erode, fade, or lose their vitality over time. We get this from carbon dating – measuring the residual amount of carbon-14 in dead organic matter to estimate its age from the current date on the calendar. The radioactive potency of the carbon-14 erodes over time at a constant rate. Is an education like carbon-14? Does education have half-life? If so, once awarded, how many years is the education celebrated by a college degree relevant in an ever-changing world? What aspects of a college education are durable and what aspects erode? What is the half-life of a baccalaureate?
What do we know?
There is a structure to most baccalaureates. First-year students must prove they belong in higher education and must take foundational courses. Some frosh took AP courses in high school to get a head start; most frosh did not. One or two courses are known in the student body as “culling the herd” courses meaning they are purposefully difficult and students who do not do well often give up on their baccalaureate goal.
Second-year students begin to focus on a major, a sequence of that builds the student’s knowledge and understanding of facts, concepts, and skill sets necessary to be competent in the field of study. In the third or fourth year, a student may narrow the major to a specific discipline within the major. A student may need to complete a practicum, an on-the-job field experience, doing the work of the discipline prior earning a baccalaureate.
I earned a BA in secondary education with majors in social studies and English. My credits included 36+ in geography, history, and political science and 36+ in literature and composition. I completed education coursework in my junior year. In my senior year I was a student-teacher for one semester in a high school social studies classroom. I graduated with a degree and a state-issued teaching license. That was in 1970.
Research today says that the half-life of a degree refers to the length of time during which 50% of the specific knowledge and hard skills learned in college lose their market value or operational relevance. The duration of value and relevance have diminished over time. In the 1960s half-life was 30 years. A baccalaureate had value and relevance for the duration of a career. In the 1980-90s half-life was 10 to 15 years. A baccalaureate required mid-career retraining. Today the half-life is 3 to 5 years due to the acceleration of new tech skills and applications. Tech permeates how durable knowledge and skills are applied.
At a cost of $50,000 to $125,000 (the averages of in-state and out-of-state tuition and fees)!! Three to five years!! How does a baccalaureate make any sense?
A ticket to ride.
First and foremost, a baccalaureate is a ticket to ride into the future. Once you have it, you cannot lose it.
A baccalaureate –
- Is an accomplishment. It says you can set a goal and complete it. You can persevere. Today when many do not seek a college degree because of cost and time, your accomplishment tells employers and others that you can see a goal through to the end. You invested 4+ years and thousands of dollars in You.
- Is a game changer – it opens doors. Written or unwritten, a baccalaureate is a requirement for access to interviews and candidate selections. If you have it, you are in the door. If you do not have it, you are not even considered. This is a reason for many people completing a baccalaureate later in life. They are doing what is necessary for their life goals.
- Increases in value with higher education and training. In my field, education, a BA led to an MA and the MA led to a PhD. Each later degree opened opportunities otherwise closed to me. With increased education, I added knowledge and skills, but just as importantly, jobs that I wanted became available.
One can bemoan cost and potential student debt till the cows come home, but at the end of the day college degrees are tickets to ride where those without cannot go.
The humanities and liberal education of college are undervalued.
Educated men wrote the idea and ideals of our nation. 55% of the signers of the Declaration of Independence and Constitution were college graduates and 80% were classically educate and read. They knew and studied the works of Greeks and Roman and early European political and economic writers. They valued concepts of human rights and responsibilities learned in their studies. The humanities and liberalized thinking were at the foundation of our nation.
America is replete with stories of leaders born in log cabins and rags to riches successes. However, in each of these stories lies a brain that self-educated and built a future upon learning.
Too many of today’s leaders build their following on the biases of the undereducated, underemployed, and uninformed. It is easier to create fears among those under-read in the humanities than among those who know and understand philosophies and rational thought. They attack universities and colleges because educated and informed citizens are anathema to their political goals.
The Big Duh!
The ladder of education is a life necessity. A quality PK-12 is just a beginning. A post-high school education builds employment and fulfillment capacities. A baccalaureate degree, though costly in time and resources, is a game changer and door opener. Parallel to that degree is technical college training combined with humanities studies. A young adult with either of these passkeys is prepared for her or his future.
A baccalaureate and a technical education are each victim to half-life erosion because technical knowledge and skills constantly change. The humanities and philosophical learning do not erode, they are durable. They gain value and power with life’s experiences. To offset the half-life reality of our non-durable learning, an educated person who has invested in learning and knows how to succeed in collegiate and technical education continually hits the “reset” button of their knowledge and skills. Unlike Carbon-14, the human brain and willpower have a “reset” button that renews and replaces what time erodes.